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If Dirt Were Dolares
For All Nails #136: If Dirt Were Dolares by Mike Keating ---- :Chapultepec, Mexico Central, USM :Harold Pickett's apartment :2 December 1974 :7:57 PM Harold Pickett let himself into his apartment, a suitcase in one hand and the accumulated mail from the post office in the other. He was exhausted, having decided it wasn't safe to go to Germany. He wasn't sure the Empire's people would be arresting him, but the CBI would sooner or later have figured out that the Edward Allen who'd been coincidentally making the same trip as him was the wrong man. By the time he was on the ground, the Germans might have decided to do the CNA a favor (if he was unlucky). He didn't think that was likely, but he took no chances. At the same time, he had to get out of Boston without being tailed, before the CBI saw its mistake. Pickett was not a religious man, but he took a moment to thank God for the fact there was a man really named Edward Allen from Black Rock going to Germany. Strange luck, he thought. What he had eventually done was to buy a ticket for the next airmobile to Germany, but not actually board the flight. The next step had been a bus to New York, followed by an airmobile to Spain. Then another airmobile all the way back to the USM. He wondered if he'd ever get back. His international subversion days were over, but he might be there someday if he went into hiring himself out as a freelancer. Harold closed the door and walked into the main room. He found the sofa and collapsed onto it, closing his eyes for a second. After a moment, he wondered what was on the vita. He got up took the few steps necessary to get to the set, and turned it on. The Spanish station wasn't transmitting at all; there was some sort of technical difficulty. He switched to the English station. Pickett stared at the screen in puzzlement. What he was seeing was a large, dark blue, almost-spherical shaped object. It was actually a polyhedron with many faces, some of the faces having six sides and some only five. It wound up looking like a blue New Grenada-style football. A voice over started as the object was shown falling through the Earth's atmosphere like a meteor. "Ever wish you could live the last week over? Well, my name's Franco Perez y I do it all the time. I work for this top secret military team that's got a portatiempo. FN1 So whenever anything kicks the duck, I'm the poor guy who has to go back y fix it. Problem is, you can only go back one week." "One Week" turned out to be the name of the vita show, and it seemed to be the first episode. That explained why he couldn't recall seeing it before he left for the CNA. The plot was some nonsense involving Serb terrorists who crossed the Atlantic and crashed a small airmobile into the Presidential palace while the German Chancellor was on a state visit, killing the leaders of both countries. Then the leaders of this AUSM secret lab had to rush their technology, which wasn't even working yet, into use and pick a pilot, all within a week. Pickett snorted derisively. When it was "revealed" that aliens had crashed in the Mexico del Norte desert in 1947 and most of the science from that craft went into this one, he gave up and turned off the set. That wasn't even original; it was done on that Australian show Space Saga. FN2 And wasn't that supposed to be in the Australian desert? He got a drink, then started to go through his mail. "You may already have won a lot of money!" Right. That went into the trash. There were assorted other sales pitches and trash. Then there was the letter from his sister in Puerto Hancock. He read it, saw that there was no major news; she just wanted to say hello. Finally, there was an official-looking envelope. Bridges y Dominguez, a law firm in San Francisco. Odd. What were they sending him a letter for? The only connection he had with San Francisco was that his rich uncle Sal lived there ... The answer hit him like a ton of bricks. He tore open the envelope. Uncle Sal had died in a loke accident. Since Sal'd been unmarried and childless, the fortune was to be split between Harold and his sister. Each share was enough to make either one rich by itself. Harold got a pencil and paper to work out the math. His take would convert to just under 1.4 million CNA pounds. That's almost half what I funneled into the army clubs. He could go back to the CNA and stay there. He could join the Brotherhood on a more permanent basis, using this money to help them. He decided to talk to some friends in the Birthright Foundation first. They might have an interest in this and could be persuaded to contribute some of their own money. The revolution was still decades in the making, but it had one good step up; now it had another. I can make this start to work. ---- Forward to FAN #137: Hey Mister, That's Me Up On the Jukebox. Forward to 11 December 1974: Page 93. Forward to Harold Pickett: Where Are They Right Now? Return to For All Nails. Category:Pickett